Dear Ginny
by A-Frosted-One
Summary: What if Harry and Ginny had decided to write to each other when they first met on Platform Nine and Three Quarters? H/G eventually.
1. Platform Nine and Three Quarters

Harry Potter stood alone in the crowd bustling through King's Cross Station, staring at his ticket as if willing the embossed words to give him some clue of how exactly he was meant to get to the Platform Nine and Three Quarters they so proudly indicated. The guard had been no help, and the glare he received when he mentioned the platform number was reminiscent enough of his Aunt that Harry almost ducked an imaginary flying pan on instinct as he flinched away. He wished he'd had the idea to use Hedwig to write to Hagrid, or even that Malfoy boy, over the month he'd spent waiting for today. Perhaps one of them would have mentioned how to get onto the platform in a letter if he had bothered to contact them.

As he watched the clock tick closer to the 11 o' clock departure, Harry wondered vaguely whether his suspicions that day Hagrid had taken him to London for his school supplies had been true, and the Dursleys had really been playing some long-winded prank on him. Of course, he knew from bitter experience that they had nothing close to the sense of humour required to pull something like that off, and he doubted they'd have let their precious Diddykins be so humiliated in the process. Harry smiled to himself as he remembered the sight of Hagrid pointing his umbrella at his increasingly porcine cousin, before another memory of the pink, polka-dotted brolly took its place.

Perhaps Platform Nine and Three Quarters was, like Diagon Alley, hidden behind a wall somewhere, and the only way he could reach it would be through tapping the right brick. He looked up at the clock again in despair at the thought. There were hundreds of bricks on the wall between Platforms Nine and Ten, and he had no idea how he'd be able to test them all in the ten minutes he had before the train left, especially without arousing the suspicions of the people still milling around him. Hagrid had seemed quite worried about the consequences of breaching the Statute of Secrecy, and Harry had no desire to find out what it was that could scare the huge man so much. On the other hand, he wanted even less to return to the Dursleys' home, and so resigned himself to his search.

No sooner had he stepped towards the wall, reaching into his pocket for his wand than he caught an exasperated-sounding voice above the chattering of the crowd behind him. "I don't know why they insist on having the entrance here, the place is always packed with Muggles, of course."

Hand dropping to his side, Harry spun around, searching the teeming station for the speaker. After a few moments, his eyes fell on a group of redheaded children, four boys and a small girl who was holding the hand of what he assumed was their mother. Each of the boys was pushing a trolley with a trunk like his own, and the tallest of the boys also had a slightly bedraggled, tawny owl in a cage perched in the top basket of his trolley.

Harry pushed his own trolley behind them, his heart pounding against his chest as he came to a stop just close enough behind them to make out their conversation.

"Now, do you remember the platform number?" the woman asked, smiling down at her daughter.

"Nine and three-quarters!" the girl happily replied, before her face fell, a few tears leaking from her hazel eyes. "Mum, can't I go to Hog-"

"You know you're not old enough yet, Ginny, now be quiet. You'll be able to go with your brothers next year. Now, Percy, you can go first."

The boy with the owl on his trolley strode forward towards the wall between Platforms Nine and Ten, his chest puffed outwards. Harry stared after him, straining his ears and forcing himself not to blink in case he missed the incantation to open the barrier, but just as the boy reached the wall, a large group of tourists swarmed through the space between them, cutting off Harry's sight of the barrier and muffling the words to any spell he might have needed to cast. The boy had already disappeared by the time the backpackers had cleared, and the kindly woman was already sending her next child off, though not before Fred, or was it George, had mocked his mother for confusing the names of her twin sons. Harry had a perfect view of the barrier this time, though it did little to help his confusion as both Fred then George, or George then Fred, strode up to the brick wall and promptly vanished, trolley and all.

Harry supposed he had no other option, and pushed his trolley up alongside the remaining redheads.

"E- excuse me," he mumbled to the plump woman, her hand still firmly clasped around her daughter's. Harry vaguely wondered what she might have done to be grabbed like that, after all the Dursleys only seemed to touch him for long enough to throw him back into his cupboard, he'd never been bad enough for them to hold onto him for that long. He shrunk back slightly as both the woman and girl turned to him, although they didn't seem to notice.

"Oh, hello dear," she replied, looking down at him. "Is it your first time at Hogwarts? Ron's new, too."

She gestured at the last tall, thin boy at her side. He grinned back at Harry, his freckled face aglow with excitement.

"Y-yes, Ma'am," Harry said, dipping his head slightly in preparation for the blow "T-the thing is, I don't really know how I'm meant to-"

"Get onto the platform?" she said kindly, and Harry nodded in shock. Perhaps she didn't want to hit him in public. "Not to worry, all you have to do is walk straight at that barrier there." She pointed to the barrier where her other children had disappeared. "Don't stop, and it's very important you not be scared that you'll crash into it. You're probably a bit nervous, so best do it at a bit of a run. Go on now, you can go before Ron."

"Er-" Harry wasn't sure exactly how running towards the solid wall was meant to make him any less frightened of crashing into it, but the others had managed it alright, and the woman didn't seem to want to hurt him yet. "Okay", he said, looking up at her. He pulled on his trolley to face it towards the barrier, and stared at the cold, unyielding wall before him, looking for any shimmer or sign that it wasn't quite as hard as it looked. The orange-red bricks, as if sensing his gaze, stubbornly refused to do anything at all. He shrugged and started to walk towards them, but just as he took a step a flash of fiery red caught the corner of his eye and he faltered, to a hoot of annoyance from his caged owl. Glancing apologetically towards Hedwig, Harry turned again to the girl, whose blazing hair he now realised had been the source of his distraction. She looked back at him for a moment, a questioning expression in her teary eyes, before bowing her head away from him, a slight pink tinge on her cheeks.

Hedwig ruffled her feathers again, clearly wondering what exactly the delay was, and a flash of an idea struck Harry. He walked over to the girl, heart pounding in his chest, and took her free hand loosely in his.  
"H-hey," he stammered, mentally cursing himself. That wouldn't do. He took a breath and tried again. "My friend Hagrid bought me this lovely owl, but I don't have much for her to do. You see, I don't really have anyone to write to outside of Hogwarts."

She'd almost turned her head back to look at him, but with the mention of the school the girl had sniffed and looked away again, though she left her hand where it was. Harry supposed he'd better get to the point quickly, so he didn't upset her any more and blow his first chance at a new friendship.

"I-I was wondering whether you'd mind if I were to write to you, G-Ginny." Her head snapped up, eyes wide. He'd insulted her, he knew it. "Only so you could know some more about Hogwarts before you-" Harry only got halfway through his spluttered apology before he'd felt arms close around his torso. He flinched, but she didn't seem to notice as she thanked him profusely, tears now streaming unabated down her cheeks.

"Thank you thank you thank you I'd love to finally have somebody to write to thank you so-" her eyes widened again as she caught herself and pulled back, looking up in fear at her mother, who was gazing down at the pair. "If it's OK for me to write to him, Mum," she whispered, a pleading tone in her voice.

Her mother seemed stuck for a moment, but a warm smile quickly spread across her face.

"Of course you can write to your friend, Ginny," she gushed, embracing her daughter in a deep hug, by chance catching a glimpse of the large clock on the wall behind her. She stiffened slightly and turned back to her son and Harry.

"Oh dear, I didn't notice the time. You two need to get onto the platform quickly, or you'll miss the Express! Off you go now, Ron."

The lanky boy took off towards the barrier, bumping a young tourist couple out of the way in his haste, but vanishing before they could turn to admonish him. They looked at each other in confusion before hurrying on towards the other side of the station, leaving Harry, Ginny and her mother momentarily alone.

"Now then," the woman said, her tone suddenly business-like, "no more time for dawdling, get yourself through that barrier if you want to make it to school on time. Do try not to knock any muggles over though, dear. I don't know how Ron could be so clumsy"

Harry grabbed his trolley and began to stride towards the wall, head filled with worry at the prospect of being late for his first day at school. He had no idea how he'd get to Hogwarts if he missed the train. As he neared the brickwork, a voice snapped him out of his thoughts.

"Oh, I almost forgot. Who should we address your letters to?"

He hadn't thought of that. He wondered briefly how letters in the magical world made it to the right person, but he supposed he'd just have to hope nobody at Hogwarts shared his name.

"Harry Potter", he replied, moments before the whole world seemed to twist around him as the front of his trolley touched the barrier, and he stumbled onto the open tiles of Platform Nine and Three Quarters.

On the other side of the barrier, a squeal pierced through the chattering of the crowds bustling around King's Cross Station.

"Harry Potter's going to write to me!"


	2. Compartments and Cakes

A/N: Thanks for all your reviews so far, they've been more positive than I expected. If you do notice any glaring issues, please feel free to bash me over the head with them, especially in this chapter. You may notice it got away from me a little.

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Harry knelt on the hard paving of the platform where he'd landed for a moment, shaking his head in an attempt to stop the world spinning around him from his first magical journey, as his ears adjusted to the sounds of the waiting crowd. If this was what all transportation was like in the wizarding world, Harry thought he might prefer just to walk wherever he needed to get to. It might have been slower, but muggle travel was certainly nowhere near as nauseating, even when Uncle Vernon seemed to be trying his hardest to make Harry sick.

A shrill whistle pulled Harry from his musings, and he looked up at its source to see thick, white smoke pouring from the crimson engine. A quick glance at the clock confirmed his suspicions, and Harry pulled himself to his feet, shaking the last dregs of dizziness from his head. He lifted the trunk from his trolley, suddenly very grateful the Dursleys had only ever allowed him two sets of Dudley's old clothes. It may not have left much opportunity for style or self-expression, but it certainly made for easier hauling. Another whistle sounded over the noise of the crowd, and Harry heaved his belongings up onto the car and shut the door behind him as the train began to pull away from the station.

Harry dragged his trunk through the corridor, before coming to a stop at an empty compartment. He supposed most of the rest of the students were giving their last goodbyes from the doors of the carriage, and would come looking for a compartment once they'd left the station proper. An ache rose up in Harry's chest as he gazed longingly out of the window at the waving families, but he quickly quashed it back down. It wasn't as if he had anyone left he'd want to be waving to, anyway.

Tearing his eyes from the window, Harry began to search the top layer of his trunk for a schoolbook to read. He'd just spotted his copy of _The Standard Book of Spells (Grade 1)_ by Miranda Goshawk, intending to learn some more incantations, when a flash of red in the window caught the edge of his vision for the second time that morning. He looked up to see Ginny running along the yellow tiles, her eyes scanning up and down the train. Harry smiled despite himself. He wished, for the first time in his life, that he'd had a younger sibling like her, willing to try to keep up with the rapidly accelerating locomotive in search of one last goodbye. Her eyes stopped roaming the carriages, and she smiled and waved up at the train.

Up at him.

Harry froze for a moment. He tentatively waved back to his new quill-pal, whose smile widened as she sped up to keep pace with his carriage. They grinned and waved to each other even after Ginny was forced to stop so as not to fall off the edge of the platform, neither of the two looking away until long after they'd faded to pinpricks from each other's sight. Harry finally let his arm fall to his side, but the smile stayed firmly in place. He couldn't remember the last time he'd had somebody to wave to.

The rattling of the compartment door opening behind him shook Harry from his reverie. His stomach gave a small lurch as he caught a glimpse of orange hair reflected in the window, although he knew there was no way his new, and only, friend could have been there. He had, after all, just watched her fade into the distance. Ginny's hair wasn't even close to that colour, anyway. It was a much deeper red, with fiery orange highlights that seemed almost to dance in the sunlight. Harry wondered for a moment how he'd noticed that after the short time they'd known each other, when he couldn't have said any more about his Aunt Petunia's hair than that it was blonde, even though he'd lived with her for the last ten years. He supposed ducking heavy pans must have made it difficult to notice details, and it probably helped that he'd only last seen Ginny a few moments earlier.

"All the other compartments were full, d'you mind if I sit in here?" the redhead's apologetic tone pulled Harry out of his thoughts once again. The accent felt familiar, but somehow he didn't think he'd ever actually heard it before. Harry turned to face the source of the voice, his smile shrinking very slightly as his eyes crossed the freckled face of the youngest of Ginny's brothers before him, although the other boy didn't seem to notice anything wrong. He shook his head noncommittally and the boy sat down opposite, glancing at Harry before looking quickly out of the window as if he hadn't been looking at all, his cheeks reddening slightly.

The pair sat in silence for a few minutes as they watched the houses flashing past the window, until the door opened again. They both turned to see the twins, Fred and George, leaning through from the corridor.

"Hey, Ron," one twin said, "we're going to go down to the middle of the train. Lee's got a giant tarantula down there."

"Ok," Ron mumbled in reply.

The twins looked at each other for a moment, as if in silent conversation, before the other twin spoke up.

"Hey," he said, "we saw you earlier outside the platform, but I don't think we were introduced. We're Fred and George Weasley, and this is our brother, Ron. I think you've already met our sister," he paused and grinned at the dark-haired boy, while his twin brother wiggled his eyebrows at him. "of course, she's been going on about how she was going to marry you for years, but we didn't think you'd be quite as keen as you've been, Mr Potter."

How did they know his name? Harry looked up in confusion, but the twins were already turned to leave before he could begin to open his mouth to ask them.

"Well, we'll be seeing you later, then." The twins quickly walked off down the train, the door sliding shut behind them.

There was a moment's silence in the compartment, as the redheaded boy seemed lost in thought.

"Are you really Harry Potter?" he blurted out suddenly.

Harry nodded slowly, still thoroughly unused to his newfound fame.

"Oh, I thought Fred and George might have been joking again. They've been going on about how you'd be coming to Hogwarts this year whenever they could, but I thought they were just trying to get a reaction out of Ginny."

Harry felt the boy's eyes drifting towards his forehead, and he felt a rush of empathy for the Boa Constrictor he'd met at the zoo.

"Have you really got the, you know…"

Harry pulled back his hair, revealing the lightning-shaped scar. Ron stared at it, eyes wide.

"Is that from You-Know-Who?" he breathed.

Harry sighed, but the boy seemed undeterred. "Yes, but all I can remember of it is a lot of green light."

"Wow."

Harry dropped his hand back to his side, obscuring his scar once again, but the other boy kept staring. He felt a surge of irritation, and was just about to say something when Ron stiffened and looked quickly out of the window. Harry picked up his copy of The Standard Book of Spells, Grade 1 and started reading.

"Are you really going to write to my sister?" Ron asked, after a few minutes of silence.

Harry looked up from the story of the Wizard Baruffio and his bison, and stared at the boy for a moment.

"Of course I am, why wouldn't I?" he slowly responded.

"Oh, I didn't mean it like that. I just thought you should know that Ginny can go a bit over the top sometimes. I think she gets it from Looney."

Harry decided not to reply to Ron's comment about his friend, but he couldn't ignore the odd name the redhead had used. Was it some sort of Wizarding comic book? He knew from his occasional glimpses of Dudley's ones that they had strange names like Dandy or Beezer, and he knew of at least one Wizarding newspaper, so perhaps wizards had their own magazines too.

"Looney?"

"Sorry, I meant Luna. Lovegood." He added in afterthought. "She's completely loopy, and best friends with Ginny, but that's only because she's the only other magical person their age around."

"So you call your sister's best friend Looney? That's not very nice."

The tips of Ron's ears turned red.

"Not to her face, obviously!"

"Oh, just behind her back then?" Harry felt a surge of anger as he remembered how his classmates used to talk to each other about his sellotaped glasses and hand-me-downs when he was at school. It hadn't quite hurt as much as the beatings, but it wasn't exactly a fond memory, and he wasn't about to let it happen to somebody else if he could help it. "Not brave enough to say it to her face?" he spat, his indignation temporarily crushing any fears of retribution.

Ron stiffened, his ears crimson as he balled his fists, and Harry shifted in his seat, glancing towards the door. Before Harry could make a move, Ron slumped back into his chair, his face falling as the redness left his ears, apparently to fill the rest of his face. He looked down at the floor. For a few moments, though it felt like an eternity, neither boy spoke, until the redhead finally broke the silence with a sigh.

"No, I'm not brave enough," he whispered sullenly, a tear making its way down his long, freckled nose. Harry gaped at him. This was not the beating he'd been expecting, and he had no idea what he was meant to do in this situation, whatever the situation was. At least he knew how to deal with physical violence, generally run like hell and hope you're not surrounded. Harry suspected that wasn't the right answer here, however badly he wanted it to be.

In lieu of any better answers, Harry sat silently, waiting for the redheaded boy to calm down and hoping he might be able to help somehow, as he felt his own anger drain away, regret seeping into its place. He'd never wanted to hurt the other boy, just stop him from saying such hurtful things, and instead he'd just caused more pain. Perhaps his Uncle Vernon had been right after all. Harry was a nasty freak.

For what felt like tenth time that day, Harry was pulled from his thoughts by a Weasley as the sniffles coming from the bench opposite finally stopped. He looked up to meet Ron's eyes, both boys unknowingly mirroring each other's reproachful gaze. He took a deep breath.

"Sorry," they apologised in unison, eyes widening in confusion. Harry was once again left speechless. He couldn't remember anybody ever saying sorry to him before, if he didn't count the times he'd been told to say sorry by his Aunt Petunia after he'd done something wrong. Dudley and Uncle Vernon had generally preferred to just whack him around a bit instead.

They lapsed back into an uncomfortable silence for a few moments, before finally looking up to meet each other's eyes. A silent agreement passed between them. They were both forgiven, but neither boy had any desire to bring the offending discussion up again any time soon. Silence filled the compartment once again as the pair gazed out of the window at the passing scenery, although it was not nearly as oppressive as it had been before.

"So," Harry said, hoping to break the spell, "are all of your family wizards?"

Ron looked confused for a moment.

"Um, I think so. I know my brothers and Ginny are magical, and so are all of the relatives I've met. I think Mum mentioned a second cousin who's an accountant once, but I don't remember ever meeting him."

A doubt that had niggled at the back of Harry's mind since his trip to Diagon Alley made its way to the front of his mind.

"You must know loads of magic already then, with all your family being magical and all," he muttered, just loud enough for Ron to hear. Loud enough, that is, if Ron hadn't already been distracted by the arrival of a small, smiling lady pushing a trolley of sweets down the corridor.

The door slid open, and a kindly voice came through it.

"Would any of you dears like anything off the cart?"

Out of habit, Harry looked down at the floor. The Dursleys never let him have sweets unless somebody explicitly called them out about it, and he'd decided they weren't really worth the punishment anyway. He was about to shake his head and return to his book when the weight of the bag of gold and silver coins in his pocket brought a grin to his face. What the Dursleys didn't know couldn't hurt him, after all.

Harry stood up and walked towards the door, vaguely registering Ron's comment about having brought sandwiches but pushing it to the back of his mind as he instead tried to decide what he'd buy. He remembered the time Dudley had dropped one of his pile of Mars Bars down the back of the sofa without noticing, and the memory of the taste of the chunk of chocolate and caramel when he'd snuck out of his cupboard that night to fish it out filled his head. It had been more than worth the risk of a beating for being caught out of his cupboard, even after he'd had to pick off the bundle of hairs and dust that had settled on it.

Harry had just resolved to buy as many of the confection as he could carry, when he reached the bustling cart to find not a single Mars Bar in sight. Not just Mars Bars, but Marathons, Twixes, Lion bars and even Blackjacks, the disgusting sweets Mrs Figg seemed to have an endless supply of, were absent from the trolley. Instead, he found an assortment of strangely named sweets with flashing packages, advertising such delights as Pumpkin Pasties, Liquorice wands, Chocolate Frogs, and several stacks of red and white-striped boxes filled with something called Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans, which apparently promised 'A risk with every mouthful!'. Uncertain as to what any of the sweets on offer actually were, and not wanting to miss anything, Harry carried a small selection of everything back to the compartment, his coin pouch lighter by 11 silver Sickles and a few bronze Knuts.

Ron stared at him, half-wrapped sandwich in hand, as Harry dumped the sweets in a pile on his chair.

"Hungry, are you?"

A guilty feeling rose up in Harry's stomach as he remembered the redhead's earlier comment about his sandwiches, but it was quickly replaced by a much more urgent sense of emptiness. He took a bite out of a pumpkin pasty.

"Starving" he grinned back. "Want one?"

Harry had never had anything to share before, or indeed anyone to share it with. He worried that in his excitement he might have come on a little fast, and judging from the colouring of the redhead's face, he thought, grin fading, he was probably right.

"Nah, I'm alright," Ron muttered, taking a bite from one of his sandwiches and unsuccessfully attempting to hide his grimace, "Mum made us all sandwiches, anyway." His voice dropped slightly, though not quite enough that Harry couldn't hear. "Never remembers I don't like corned beef, though."

That settled it.

"Swap you for one of these?" Harry tantalizingly waved a pumpkin pasty in the space between them, smiling to himself as Ron's eyes followed the treat through the air. A few seconds of teasing later, however, the redhead tore his eyes away from the pastry and placed them firmly back on his sandwich.

"You won't want this, it's really dry. She doesn't have much time, making food for all five of us."

Harry was not going to be so easily put down.

"Go on, you know you want to."

Ron seemed poised to argue, but a rumbling in his stomach betrayed him and the pair soon found themselves making their way through Harry's assortment of sweets, chatting as if they hadn't just met that day. As Harry tried the corned beef sandwiches, which, while significantly better than Ron had made out, did not go well with Sugar Mice, the conversation turned back to their families.

"They really left you to grow up with Muggles?" Ron blurted out through a mouthful of Cauldron Cake, oblivious to the small chunks of food he spat with every syllable. "What are they like?"

"Absolutely bloody awful," Harry replied. "Well, my Cousin, Aunt and Uncle are, anyway. The rest of them are alright though," he quickly added. He wasn't sure what had possessed him to curse, even if it was nothing close to the kind of words his Uncle Vernon used on a regular basis, generally to describe Harry himself, but he allowed himself a rueful grin as he glanced at his feet. It was nice not to worry about flying pans for once. He looked back up at Ron. "I wish I'd had a witch and three wizard brothers."

"Five brothers," Ron corrected him, a gloomy look on his face. "I'm the sixth. Bill's the oldest, he was the Head Boy. Charlie's 2 years younger, but he was a prefect and Quidditch Captain. He just left Hogwarts this year. Percy's a prefect now, and Fred and George mess around loads but they still get really good marks, and everyone thinks they're hilarious. Everyone expects me to do as well as them, but even if I do it's no big deal because they've already done it. I never get anything new, either. I've got Bill's old robes and Charlie's old wand, and Scabbers here used to be Percy's before dad gave him an owl for being made prefect." He pulled a fat, grey rat from his jacket and placed it on the windowsill, where it lay still.

"He's useless, hardly ever wakes up. I was hoping for an owl, but they couldn't – I got Scabbers instead."

Ron's ears had turned pink again, and he turned to stare intently out of the window, thoughts of food forgotten. Harry wasn't quite sure what Ron was so upset about, but he didn't want to risk upsetting him again, so said nothing as he watched the trees and fields passing by the window. He'd never seen so much green before.

A little while later, Harry was back to reading his schoolbook, murmuring the incantation to the wand-lighting charm under his breath, and Ron was sorting through his collection of Famous Wizard Cards from the chocolate frogs they'd finished, when the compartment door slid open to reveal a round-faced boy, his eyes reddened and slightly moist.

"Sorry, have either of you seen a toad at all?"

When both Ron and Harry shook their heads, the boy in the doorway burst into tears, and judging by the state of his face, not for the first time that day.

"I've lost him! He keeps escaping from me!"

Harry racked his brains for a solution. When Dudley lost something, Uncle Vernon would normally just send his wife out to buy him something else he wanted, normally after finding some excuse to blame Harry. He had a vague memory of a teacher comforting one of his classmates at school over a lost doll, and decided that might be a better example to follow. He took a breath and looked up at the tearful boy.

"He'll turn up eventually," Harry assured him, as he tried not to think about all of the ways the poor boy's pet could be lost on the busy train. "I'm sure of it." He fixed the other boy with a steely look that he hoped was in some way reassuring, and made an effort not to notice the array of wide open windows in the corridor behind him.

Somehow, his words seemed to have helped, and the round-faced boy sniffed, then turned to continue his search.

"We'll come find you if we see him!" Harry promised as the door slid shut.

"Honestly, I don't see what he's so upset about," Ron blurted out as soon as the door had shut. "If I'd brought a toad, I'd have lost it first thing I could." A pensive expression crossed his face for a moment, then quickly retreated as it realised just how out of place it was among the freckles. "S'pose I can't really talk, though. I did bring Scabbers."

Harry averted his eyes to hide his growing annoyance at Ron's insistence on badmouthing people behind their backs, but it was a futile gesture as the redhead was already focusing on the sleeping rat, a scowl worthy of Dudley on his 7th birthday pursing his lips.

"He could be dead and you'd never be able to tell the difference. I tried a spell my brother, George, gave me yesterday to turn him yellow, just so he'd be a bit more interesting, but it didn't do anything. Here, I'll show you."

He pulled a badly chipped wand from his trunk and picked at a white spot on its end, muttering something Harry couldn't quite make out about Unicorns. He'd just pointed his wand at the unconscious rat when the door was opened again and a bushy-haired girl, already dressed in a black Hogwarts robe walked in, followed a few steps behind by the round-faced boy from earlier.

"Has anyone seen Neville's toad? He says he's lost it."

"We already told him we haven't seen it," Ron replied stiffly, but the girl ignored him, staring at the wand still clutched tightly in his hand.

"Are you doing magic, then? Let's see it."

She pushed some of the pile of sweets over and sat down next to Harry, looking back for a moment to direct Neville to the seat next to Ron, then staring so intently at the freckled boy's wand that she didn't seem to notice that Neville hadn't followed her symbolic instruction.

Ron seemed a little scared of the audience, but nonetheless tightened his grip on the battered wand in his hand, before he cleared his throat and began to recite an incantation under his breath. Harry could only pick out a few words in the supposed spell, but they seemed nothing like the spells mentioned in his schoolbook, which tended to be made up of only a single word which looked suspiciously similar to the Latin he'd learned at school. Harry supposed there must have been real spells like that, though. Ron had grown up with a family of wizards, after all, so he should have been able to tell that it wasn't a real spell if they were all made up of faux-latin like _Reparifage_ or _Incendio_ were. Of course, the bossy girl had barely known Ron for all of 5 minutes, so knew none of what Harry, who had spent the better part of the day with the redhead, had been able to deduce.

"Are you sure that's actually a real spell? It's not very good, is it? Unless you're casting it wrong, I guess, I've only had a chance to try a few spells, but they've all worked so far for me. I'm the only one in my family with magic, it was a complete surprise when the letter came, but I'm ever so pleased, of course, I mean, I've heard Hogwarts is the best school of witchcraft there is, even the French seem to agree and they have their own school, at least according to the books, I've learned all of our textbooks by heart, naturally, I haven't had much of a chance to brew many potions yet, though, I just hope what I've been able to do will be enough preparation not to fall too far behind," she finally paused her rapid tirade for a few moments, maybe to finally take a breath, and seemed to notice the others staring back at her, stunned looks on their faces. Neville, at least, seemed to have experienced all of this once before, though he didn't look like he'd had any more success understanding her. The brown-haired girl flushed lightly, and turned her intent gaze on the redheaded boy trapped in the corner.

"I'm Hermione Granger, by the way, how about you?"

Harry glanced at Ron's glazed expression and, guessing that he wasn't quite in a state to answer, decided to take the lead.

"This is Ron, and I'm Harry Potter."

Ron seemed to snap out of his confusion on hearing his name and nodded his assent.

"Really? I've read all about you, of course, I got a few extra books for background reading, and you're mentioned in pretty much all of the newer Magical history books. You've even got a whole chapter in the new edition of Great Wizarding Events of the Twentieth Century, and it's longer than the one on Grindelwald's rise."

By this point, Harry's face had formed a perfect imitation of Dudley confronted with a maths problem, and Hermione seemed to notice his expression as she paused, one bushy, brown eyebrow raised.

"Didn't you know? Goodness, I'd have found out anything I could if it were me. Do either of you have any idea which House you'll be Sorted into? I hear Dumbledore himself was in Gryffindor, and most of the ones I've met so far seem fantastic, but Ravenclaw wouldn't be too bad, I suppose. All of the Slytherins were horrible to us when we were looking for Trevor, that's Neville's toad, by the way, we'd better go and get back to looking for him, actually."

Hermione strode quickly past Neville into the corridor, turning to address the two boys once more.

"You two should probably change into your robes, you know, I expect we should be arriving soon."

She didn't wait for their reply before stalking off down the carriage. Neville grinned apologetically as he slid the door shut and made to follow her.

"Whatever House I end up in, I hope she's not in it too. Absolutely insane, she is," Ron grumbled, missing Harry's glare as he tossed the battered wand back into his trunk, where it let off a few yellow sparks. "Stupid spell, I bet George knew it was a dud when he gave it to me."

Harry crushed down his anger again. He didn't particularly want to annoy the brother of his only friend so soon, even if he wasn't entirely certain he wanted to spend much more time in Ron's company. With any luck they'd end up in different houses and he wouldn't need an excuse to avoid the boy. Grasping for a change of subject from complaining about other people, Harry asked the first question that came to mind.

"What Houses are your brothers in?"  
"They're all Gryffindors," Ron replied, his face falling. "Mum and Dad were, too. I don't know what they'd say if I'm not. Ravenclaw wouldn't be too bad, but Fred and George would never let me live it down if I was a Hufflepuff. And imagine if they put me in Slytherin. They'd disown me."

"That's the House Voldemort was in, right?"

"Don't say that!" Ron hissed, making Harry jump.

"What?" The change of subject had certainly been effective in diminishing Harry's anger, although the confusion that took its place may well have been worse.

"Don't say You-Know-Who's name!"

"Why not?"

"We-We just don't say it. I thought you of all people would understand."

"What, because he murdered my parents?" Harry was wrong, the anger was definitely worse than the confusion. He stood and stormed out of the compartment.

"No, I didn't mean that, just, y'know…" The redhead trailed off as he finally saw the glare Harry had spent much of the day practicing. "Sorry."

"I need some air," the raven-haired boy muttered, and slammed the sliding door shut. No sooner had he turned around to leave than he collided with two thickset boys. A crunch came from between his eyes as he struggled to remain upright, and he cursed to himself. He'd forgotten to bring any Sellotape to repair his glasses with. A moment passed before he noticed the two pairs of eyes staring down at him in thinly veiled rage.

"Oh, er, sorry," he apologised hurriedly, his anger subsiding in place of fear. He glanced around for an escape route, but the boys seemed to have the whole corridor filled. "I wasn't looking where I was going."

Both of the large boys balled their fists, mean looks on their faces, but immediately relaxed as a voice spoke from behind them.

"Don't worry about it, we heard you shouting and came to make sure everything was alright," the voice drawled, as the two boys Harry had walked into stepped aside to reveal a pale-looking boy Harry recognized from his trip to Diagon Alley. "So, is it true? They've been saying Harry Potter's in this carriage. It's you, isn't it?"

Harry's guard was back up in an instant, on an instinct he'd perfected over years of his cousin's 'gentle teasing'. He found it hard to believe that the boy he'd met in Madame Malkin's would have any interest in helping him out. On the other hand, his only other option was returning to his compartment and trying not to hit Ron. He sighed, resigned to his fate, and levelled his gaze on the blond boy.

"Yeah, I'm Harry Potter."

"I'm Malfoy, Draco Malfoy. These two," he gestured to the boys surrounding him like bodyguards, "are Crabbe and Goyle. We're here to offer you some assistance. I know how hard it must be for you to be taking your first steps in our world, especially after living with those filthy muggles. You'll soon find out that some families are much better than others, and you won't want to go making friends with the wrong sort," Malfoy glanced into the compartment Harry had just left. "I can help you with that, Potter." He held out his hand for Harry to shake, but Harry's stayed firmly at his side. As much as he might be annoyed with Ron's thoughtlessness, the boy was acting even worse. Besides, he was pretty sure Ginny would have fallen into Malfoy's idea of 'the wrong sort' too, and Harry definitely wasn't willing to betray his only friend like that.

"I think I can figure these things out for myself, thanks," he replied coolly. It didn't seem like a good idea to start a three-on-one fight against people who were both bigger than him and almost certainly knew much more magic than him. "I wouldn't want to trouble somebody of your stature."

"Well, the offer stands if you change your mind," if the pale boy was disappointed, he didn't show it. In fact, he almost looked relieved as he stalked away, closely followed by his two protectors. Harry watched them leave for a few moments, before turning and walking the other way. He hoped to avoid any more conversations for a while, but it seemed fate had other ideas as he saw a mass of bushy brown hair poke out from a compartment ahead of him, followed by the rest of Hermione Granger, who immediately began to talk at him.

"Why are you still dressed in your muggle clothes? I spoke to the driver just now, we'll be there soon, you need to get your robes on quickly or you'll be in trouble before the school year even starts," she waved him off towards his compartment, "We found Neville's toad, by the way. He'd found his way into the sweets trolley."

Harry made his way back to the compartment with his luggage, grunting a greeting to Ron as he opened the door before pulling on his robes. As he fastened his cloak around his shoulders, the train began to slow, and his stomach gave a nervous lurch. He followed the crowds of his fellow students to stand by the doors in anticipation and, when the train finally stopped at Hogsmeade station, he stepped out into the crowds.

They had arrived at Hogwarts.


	3. The Sorting

Harry Potter, Ronald Weasley, Hermione Granger and Neville Longbottom, their shadows long in the orange light of the setting sun, clambered out of their boat onto the rocky jetty and made their way up a dimly lit passageway, though not before Neville had once again retrieved his lost toad, joining the other first-years at the top of a set of rough stone stairs. They crowded around a huge, oak door and waited for the last students to make their way up from the boats. When the last few stragglers had arrived, the large man lifted the brass knocker on the heavy doors three times, and they swung open, revealing a severe-looking witch in emerald robes. Something about her stern expression gave Harry the impression that despite her age, she was not somebody to be taken lightly.

The woman waved the massed students through the open doors and into a vast entrance hall, its torch-lit stone walls curving upwards to meet somewhere in the darkness above them. Harry looked around him in awe. The Dursleys' whole house could fit into this room several times over with plenty of room to spare, and he wasn't sure he'd ever seen a staircase as opulent as the grand marble stairs at the far end of the hall. He tore his eyes from the hundreds of paintings adorning every inch of the walls for a moment to gauge the reactions of his fellow students. He noticed with a small smile that Ron seemed on the verge of fainting, and even Malfoy looked impressed, though he was pretty sure he had heard the pale boy mutter something about having a larger staircase at home. Beside him, Hermione was explaining to anyone who didn't make an overt display of not listening how the grey stone of the walls had been transfigured from the earth by Helga Hufflepuff herself, then carved into shape by an army of Salazar Slytherin's conjured knights, who then took up positions as decoration around the castle. Even though Harry didn't recognise a significant portion of the words the girl was using, the feats she was describing must have been impressive if the other students' expressions were anything to judge by.

The stern woman stood on the third step of the white marble staircase and looked out at the new students, who, she was glad to notice, quietened quickly as she introduced herself as Professor Minerva McGonagall, Deputy Headmistress of Hogwarts School of Wizardry, though she did still have to affix a few of the slower learners with her practiced withering glare when a few small groups broke into mutters while she was explaining the House system at Hogwarts, and the upcoming Sorting Ceremony.

"The Sorting will begin in a few minutes, I suggest you all take the time to smarten yourselves up."

Minerva surveyed the room from her place on the steps, lingering for a few moments on Neville's cloak, which he appeared to have somehow managed to fasten to his ear, and on Ron's untucked shirt. Most of the students made at least some token effort to clean themselves up after their long journey, but although she glared for a while at a short boy with what looked like soot on his face, he was either too oblivious or too brave to react, so she gave it up with a sigh. There was one in every year.

"I shall return soon to take you for your Sorting. Please try to stay quiet."

As soon as she had passed through the side door, the chattering immediately resumed. She had half a mind to go back in, just to see the looks on their faces as they tried to hide the fact that they'd been speaking, but decided against it. Tilly always got herself into a tiff when the feast started late, fussing endlessly over the warming charms, and it didn't do to upset the House Elves. They could worryingly effective pranksters when they wanted to be, even working within the rules placed upon them, and she already had her hands full with the Weasley twins as it was. She allowed herself a small smile before starting her way up to the Head Table. A good prank always did liven up the students.

Back in the entrance hall, the first years had worked themselves into a furore over the coming Sorting. It seemed that nobody in the room had any idea what the Ceremony entailed, other than that it would place each of them into one of the four Houses. Anything beyond that seemed to be entirely the stuff of rumour, although Harry suspected none of them had any basis in fact, given how they all seemed to contradict each other. To his side, Neville was swaying slowly, his round face white. Draco, at least, seemed happy to strut around the grand room, ignoring any comments or speculations offered, though his face did flash with something Harry couldn't decipher when Ron proudly announced that his brother had mentioned an extremely painful test. One boy had mentioned mind reading, bringing a small panic to Harry's mind. He didn't want his new teachers knowing what the Dursleys had done to him, it was never worth the beatings. Fortunately, it seemed mind-reading was about as likely as the magic necklace somebody else was talking about. Harry smiled to himself. Though he had no idea what it would be, some of the ideas people were coming up with were ridiculous. If they wanted to judge personality, it would make sense that they'd need to look into the mind, which he knew from his science classes was stored in the brain. Why use a necklace when they could use a tiara, or even just a hat, and be much closer to where they needed to be? A set of headphones like the ones Dudley had recently smashed before realising his MP3 player was at fault might be a more effective choice. Although, he mused, it didn't seem Wizards were particularly interested in the efficacy of their solutions if it got in the way of their grandeur, and a magic necklace could be pretty flashy.

A sudden hush spread across the crowd, though Harry could still see Hermione's lips moving as she recited incantations under her breath. He thought he vaguely recognised one or two of them, but before he could be sure, a pale white form a little way above the massed students' heads distracted him. Were those people floating through the walls above them? They almost looked like they might be ghosts, and they were certainly talking like people. Harry shook his head slightly. His last few weeks had been pretty effective in teaching him never to assume something was impossible, but there was no way ghosts were real. How could they be? His Mum and Dad hadn't been to see him as ghosts, and Harry knew that if he were in their position, dead before his time, he would have come back to see the son he'd left behind, whatever it took. All thoughts of magical headwear forgotten, Harry made up his mind. This was just a cruel trick, or an illusion, or some other magic trick, and the dead stayed dead.

At that moment, Professor McGonagall re-entered the hall, shooing the things Harry charitably decided to call Not-Ghosts away and saving him from the need to consider any alternative theories as to why his parents hadn't visited. On the stern Professor's instruction, he joined the rest of the first years to form an approximately straight line, groaning quietly as a redheaded boy stepped into place behind him. Just as he was considering finding some excuse to move further down the line, perhaps faking a Trevor sighting, the heavy wooden doors swung open and the terrified first-years began to make their way into the Great Hall.

The hall was certainly Great. If Harry had thought the entrance hall was big, this room in front of them made it look barely larger than his cupboard. Four huge, wooden tables stretched the length of the hall, each one set end to end with so much shining silver that Harry guessed it took the whole year to polish, based on his experience, and seating an array of students interspersed with the occasional silvery-white figure of those things he refused to call ghosts. At the far end of the hall, a long table placed perpendicular to the others seated several adults, he assumed teachers. Above the tables, hundreds of floating candlesticks bobbed back and forth, their dancing flames casting flickering shadows into every corner of the room. Craning his neck further upwards, Harry was surprised to see the bright points and swirling nebulae of the night sky above them. Even if the Dursleys didn't consider it 'freakish nonsense', the grey bleakness of Surrey provided little opportunity for stargazing, and Harry had had more important things to do than try to catch a glimpse of the moon from the windows when they'd forgotten to lock the door to his cupboard at night. He gazed upwards into the darkness as he followed the rest of the first years through the hall, so focused on keeping his balance without tearing his gaze from the spectacle that he barely registered Hermione's whispered words to the plump, redheaded girl walking a little ways in front of him.

"It's enchanted to show an exact copy of the sky above it, according to _Hogwarts, A History," _she breathed, "apparently it's really tricky to do, and this is the largest one of its type in the world."

"My Auntie mentioned some windows like this at work" the other girl replied, "but she says those ones are always malfunctioning, and they're nothing close to this ceiling anyway."

Harry's heart fell slightly as he let his daydreams of a magic ceiling in his cupboard fade away. It would have been worth the extra thrashings he'd get for magicking a room in the Dursley's own home if he were able to see this endless expanse every night, but if it was so difficult to manage he suspected he'd never get a chance anyway, even if he had been allowed to use his wand in the first place.

Professor McGonagall brought the first-years to a stop at the end of the teachers' table, before placing a tall, round stool in front of them, and a dirty bundle of rags on top of it. Glancing around the hall, it seemed to Harry that all eyes were on the grey mound, and as he tried to make out exactly what it was and why everyone was so transfixed with some old fabric, something shifted in his mind, giving way to the sudden realisation that the filthy bundle was, in fact, a pointed wizard's hat. Perhaps they'd have to make it float, or maybe pull a rabbit out of it. Harry thought he remembered his classmates talking about a magician who'd done something like that at a birthday party they'd all been invited to. It was probably a good thing the Dursleys had forbidden him from going to that one, he couldn't imagine they would've taken the news he'd seen somebody performing magic live particularly well. Harry vaguely remembered his copy of _A Beginners' Guide to Transfiguration_ mentioning that conjuration wasn't taught until NEWT level, but perhaps rabbit conjuring was one of those 'self-simplified' spells like the wand-lighting charm mentioned in _The Standard Book of Spells (Grade 1), _whose 'energy projection geometries' formed 'arithmantic primes of maximal efficiency'. He was relieved to find that he wasn't expected to understand what that actually meant beyond 'some spells are much easier to cast than they should be'. It must have been easy to do if a muggle magician could manage it, after all, and they probably expected everyone would already be more than capable of it. Perhaps Ron would have mentioned how to do it if he hadn't been so rude to him.

Harry was just wondering whether he should tell one of the teachers that he didn't actually know how to conjure a rabbit when a movement from the dirty bundle caught his eye. He stared at the hat for a moment, and just as he decided it must have been a trick of the light, it twitched again. He definitely hadn't imagined it that time, although when the hat began to sing Harry did have to pinch himself several times to make sure he wasn't dreaming. It was a relief to hear that they'd just have to put the hat on, especially with the whispers he'd heard about fighting trolls, all of which seemed to originate with two redheaded twins. On the other hand, Harry wasn't particularly excited to have his mind tested in front of the whole school. What if there'd been some mistake, and the hat refused to Sort him at all? Would they just send him back to the Dursley's on the train? He shuddered, imagining the twisted grin on his Uncle's face if he were to be expelled on his first day at 'freak school'. He didn't even notice the first girl, Hannah Abbot, get up to put the hat on, but the cheers from the table to his right broke through his thoughts, and he turned to watch the smiling girl join the Hufflepuffs, waved to an empty seat by a jolly-looking 'ghost' who floated slightly above one of the benches. A few moments later, the Hufflepuffs broke back out into cheers as Susan Bones joined their ranks as well. In the corner of his eye, Harry saw Hermione clapping along with the rest of the first years. He wondered idly whether there might be a magical remedy for hay fever.

Harry didn't recognise any of the next few students to be sorted, until 'Granger, Hermione' was called and the bushy-haired girl almost knocked over the stool in her hurry. Whatever urgency she may have felt was, however, lost on the hat. Harry could have sworn he could see a grin spread across the dirty garment, in spite of its lack of any actual face, as hat and wearer undertook a silent conversation that seemed to last for hours, but could barely have taken more than a few minutes, until the rip near the hat's brim finally opened again, its deep voice filling the hall.

'GRYFFINDOR!'

Amongst the loud cheers erupting from the red and gold-coated table, Harry heard a familiar groan. He turned to its source, a flash of red in his eyes.

"What's your problem?"

He didn't even have the decency to look reproachful.

"I don't want to share a house with her."

"And what makes you think you will be?"

The words were once again out of Harry's mouth before he could stop them, but this time he wasn't sure he'd regret it. Ignoring the redhead's indignant spluttering, he turned back to the sorting as Neville joined Hermione at the Gryffindor table, then, realising he'd forgotten to take the hat off, rushed to return it amid general laughter, with some howling and jeers coming mostly from the Slytherin side of the hall, although fair few Ravenclaws joined in too. Ron at least seemed too worried for his own impending Sorting to pay much attention to his peer's misfortune, although not quite worried enough not to snigger at the other boy's expense.

With a quiet but deliberate glare, Professor McGonagall silenced the last few titters before continuing the sorting. Harry's turn was getting close now, and the sickening feeling from before returned with a vengeance, as if another bar of lead was dropped into his stomach with every student sorted. 'Nott, Theodore', joined 'Malfoy, Draco' with the Slytherins, quickly followed by 'Parkinson, Pansy'. Harry was beginning to regret that second pumpkin pasty on the train, the growing buzzing in his ear reaching a fever pitch as 'Perks, Sally-Anne' was called up. He was dimly aware of cheering from one of the tables as the girl was Sorted, though he had no idea into which house, being much too preoccupied with the next name to be called.

"Potter, Harry!"

The leaden feeling in Harry's stomach drained away, though the relief was short-lived as the heaviness instead took up residence in his legs. Throughout the hall, undisguised whispers and muttering erupted, as everyone craned to get a look at 'The Harry Potter'. After the eternity it took Harry to walk the few long metres to the stool, he wasted no time jamming the hat firmly onto his head, hiding the nosy faces crowding the hall from his view behind the dark fabric. A few moments passed in silence before he had the strange sensation of hearing a small voice somewhere between his ears. He grabbed the stool to keep himself falling off.

"Interesting. Very interesting. Plenty of courage, not a bad mind either. I sense some fierce loyalty developing too. There's talent there, so much talent, and a desire, no, a hunger to prove it, and quite a bit of cunning under it all. It's been so long since I've had the pleasure of Sorting a mind who could thrive so readily wherever it was placed. But where to put you…"

Harry's grip on the stool tightened as he recalled the jeering Neville had received from the Slytherin table. They definitely weren't all taking part, but it was definitely more than the handful of Ravenclaws who joined in.

"Not Slytherin, not Slytherin, please don't put me with them," he pleaded under his breath.

"Are you sure? You could be great, you know, it's all right here in your head, and Slytherin will help you to on your path to greatness, there's no doubt about it. No? Alright then, if you're that certain, there can really only be one place for you."

Harry felt the tear in the hat's brim open.


	4. The Last Goodbye

Ginny Weasley was not having a normal day. She'd woken that morning in the midst of the same Weasley School Rush she'd experienced every year of her life, ready to watch another one of her brothers leave her behind, while trying and failing to persuade her mother to let her join them on the Express. Of course, all the other times she'd at least had one brother to keep her company at home, but it wasn't as if Ron's was much better than nothing anyway. He'd spent most of the last year outside, flying around the paddock on Charlie's old broomstick and leaving Ginny alone to fend for herself against their mother's household charms lessons. If she learned one more strangely specific and completely useless variant of the Scouring Charm, Ginny had a feeling she'd finally have a need for _Scourgis Vomiteluteus _after all. It didn't help that even Luna, her only friend her age, had suddenly stopped coming over near the end of January, without so much as a floo call in explanation, and both Bill and Charlie had started new jobs which apparently left them with no time to write to her anymore.

That wasn't to say she wasn't going to miss Ron. He was loads more fun than Percy, and not as much trouble as the twins, but she still found herself brooding over them plenty while they were off having fun at Hogwarts. She'd even started to miss the twins' pranks, however much she'd bemoan them at the time. Besides, it was handy to have somebody else, whose ears didn't transform into glowing, red beacons of guilt whenever questioned, to take the blame for her own pranks. It seemed unlikely that she wouldn't miss Ron when he left, too, and she was more than happy to let her parents believe it too. After all, it was all the more material for her own annual tradition: trying to persuade Mum to let her go to Hogwarts.

It had barely taken her mother ten minutes to tire of the pleading and send her upstairs on the pretence that she wouldn't mind 'finding Ron's other robes, would you dear?' Ginny felt her huffing and stomping up the stairs made it quite clear that she did, indeed, mind cleaning up after her youngest, and messiest, brother, but she searched nonetheless. She knew better than to make her mother properly angry, especially considering they'd most likely be the only two in the house for about eight hours a day until Christmas, on the reasonable assumption that her next attempts to persuade her parents would fail as usual.

Three false starts, one missing rat and several hurried slices of toast later, her father finally coaxed the battered Ford Anglia off the driveway and onto the road, ignoring Percy's insistence that he was 'just sure' he'd left something behind.

'We're late already, if you've forgotten anything we'll just have to owl it to you later,' their mother had insisted as they rounded a particularly sharp turn at considerable speed, squashing Ginny between Fred and the cushioning charms on the doors with a muffled squeal, and knocking her book from her hands. She scowled and shoved her brother off of her, silencing his faux outrage with a practiced glare. It seemed her mother's teaching could be useful, after all, even if she had a strong feeling that hadn't exactly been her intended lesson. Shaking her head, she flipped through the pages until she got back to where she had been before the interruption. Unfortunately, it seemed the hurried rustling of paper on paper had drawn the attention of her youngest brother, as he looked up from his tattered copy of _Martin the Mad Muggle, Volume 7, _speaking through his mouthful of toast.

'Wotchoo readin' 'at for 'gen, Gin?' he gestured at the book in her hands, spitting crumbs across the plastic upholstery. Ginny bristled at the nickname, but ignored him. ''aven' yoo red i' 'undred times?'

'Yeah, _Gin-Gin_,' Fred piped up, 'You must know the story by heart now.'

Ginny continued to stare at her book, feigning disinterest. As long as she didn't respond, she knew they'd eventually get bored and go back to tormenting Percy over his new Prefect badge. They were right, of course, but that didn't mean _The Boy Who Lived_ wasn't her favourite book of all time, even if she couldn't do the voices like Bill could. Besides, Ron had already packed their copy of _Quidditch Through the Ages _in his trunk, their mother brushing aside Ginny's complaints with something about 'ladylike behaviour'. Ginny was pretty sure he just took it to spite her, she'd never actually seen him read a book without pictures in it by choice. Too late, she noticed Fred reaching out to grab the book from her hands and pass it to his twin, who made a show of pretending to read it aloud, though Ginny knew he was simply reciting what Bill had told them years ago.

'Once upon a time there was a young boy by the name of Harry Potter,' George began in a singsong voice.

'He was good and kind, and never ever cried,' Fred continued.

'But one day, as Harry and his Mum and Dad were relaxing at home, the evil You-Know-Who appeared, and after a long and heroic duel, struck down both of Harry's parents.' George dropped his voice to little more than a whisper, not wanting to bring their own mother's wrath upon himself.

'But as he turned his wand against poor Harry, something changed.' Their tones shifted such that an outsider would have almost thought the twins were being serious. Ginny, of course, knew it was nothing of the sort, and refused to take their bait as she glanced idly at her nails.

'He spoke the killing curse, like so many times before, but something about the defenceless baby boy blocked it, and it rebounded, vanquishing He Who Must Not Be Named forever.'

'His job done, Harry Potter disappeared, ready to come back and save the world from the next evil Dark Lord.'

The twins both took a deep breath before speaking in unison.

'And we all lived happily ever after, thanks to The Boy Who Lived!' they finished, bowing as far as they could in their seats to imagined applause. Ron gaped at them, eyes wide, as if he hadn't had the same bedtime story since Ginny was five. He finally swallowed his mouthful of toast as he gazed at his brothers.

'Did he really destroy y-You Know Who?'

'Of course he did, oh brother of mine,' George grinned.

'That's the reason-'

'Our favourite sister-'

'Wants to marry him!' they exclaimed in unison once again, drawing their mother's attention.

'Now, boys, stop teasing Ginny or you'll have to keep her company this year.'

The threat of missing Hogwarts was sufficient to silence both boys immediately, even if they were both pretty sure their mother wouldn't actually follow through on it. It just wasn't worth the risk. Fred passed the book back with a 'Sorry, _Gin_,' in their practiced apologetic tone, just regretful enough to stop their mother fussing without giving any of their siblings the impression it was actually sincere, gaining a huff and a glare over Percy's horn-rimmed spectacles.

'How do you expect to become Prefects behaving like that?' he sniffed, chest thrust firmly outwards out to give his own gleaming badge the respect he believed it was worth.

'Isn't it obvious, brother dearest?' The twins chorused. 'We don't.'

'I'm serious, boys, one more word from the two of you and you'll be be spending the year at home.' their mother had taken on the tone Ginny was glad had only been directed at her once before, when she'd gotten into the Floo powder and sneaked off to Diagon Alley after her mother had refused to let her go into _Quality Quidditch Supplies_, even though her brothers had all been allowed in since they could walk. She hadn't even wanted to buy anything, even if her brothers all had their own brooms, it would have been enough to be able to look at the ones in the shop. After all, Ginny was quite capable of sneaking out to use their brooms when nobody was looking, in spite of her mother's insistence that Quidditch was 'unladylike'.

Aware of the growing danger but not without several looks of disdain at their older brother, the twins put their heads together and began a whispered conversation in which Ginny was sure she heard the words 'badge' and 'charm' mentioned several times. She sighed and went back to her book. She'd probably hear all about how they'd enchanted Percy's prefect badge to insult any teachers he tried to talk to, or maybe to turn invisible whenever he puffed out his chest as he'd been so fond of doing, when they came home for Christmas. That was, if she managed to successfully eavesdrop on them when they told Bill and Charlie, since apparently pranking wasn't a suitable topic for the sensitive ears of their 'ickle Gin-Gin', and they certainly weren't going to tell her anything of substance in their rare, trifling letters home. She hoped Ron might be different, but his reading habits didn't exactly instil hope that he'd beat the twins' record of one and a half lines each. Including the closing.

The rest of the journey passed relatively quietly, at least by her family's standards, with only a few passing references made regarding her lifelong crush on The Boy Who Lived. She knew it was silly, but she'd meant it when she told Bill she was going to marry Harry Potter, even if she wasn't entirely sure how she was so certain that it would happen, but she was certain of it. Could she be a seer? She vividly remembered meeting her Great-Aunt Tessie at a family gathering, where she'd gone on about all of the prophecies she'd made, but Ginny had found it strange that somebody claiming to be a prophet couldn't predict the twins transfiguring all of the many folds of lace on her dress into cobwebs, giving her the look of a strange, pink fly.

The car came to a shuddering halt, knocking Ginny from her thoughts as she looked up at the concrete forms around her. She quickly climbed out of the car behind her brothers, ignoring the look on her mother's face. Ginny knew they were both very aware of her plans, but neither mother nor daughter took any action to avoid the impending argument.

'Quickly, now, get your trunks. We're running late, so I'll have to drop you off here and you can go to the platform with your mother while I find a place to park,' her father called as he helped Ron lift his luggage from the magically expanded boot, gaining a few strange looks from passers-by, but Ginny had no idea whether it was because of the various caged animals surrounding her family or the fact that seven people and four large suitcases had somehow managed to fit inside the small Ford Anglia. Fortunately, nobody did anything more than stare, so they wouldn't have to call the Obliviators like when Ginny was five and Ron had set their old car on fire in a temper tantrum over being left behind. Sometimes, in the rare moments when the Burrow fell quiet, Ginny swore she could still hear her ears ringing from that particular telling off.

A few minutes later, at something of the wrong side of ten minutes to eleven, the Weasleys finally made it to the barrier separating Platform Nine and Three Quarters from the muggle world, as Ginny´s mother repeated the same complaints about the platform´s location she had made every year Ginny could remember to anyone nearby who cared to listen in. Normally that was restricted to the passing muggles, most of whom seemed to believe that the redheaded clan were from some foreign country, at least based on the occasional angry mutters she could pick out of the station noise. This time, however, 'anyone nearby' also appeared to include a boy, barely bigger than Ginny, with a mop of messy black hair that seemed to point in all directions but downwards, and what looked to be spell-o-taped glasses balanced precariously on his nose. If Ginny had been a little older, she might have thought the mismatched boy in a too-large t-shirt looked cute, but she was barely ten years old and as such simply wondered where the raven-haired boy's parents might be, before her thoughts turned back to her mother, and the next phase of their annual verbal sparring match. A thought occurred to her, and she smiled to herself as she tried to dredge up her saddest memories, most of which, it struck her, were right there in the station.

If Ginny had hoped that her mother might have slipped and finally let her onto the platform in the midst of their time-induced panic, she had failed to account for Molly Weasley's head for pressure. She was in her element here, brushing Ginny off almost before she'd managed to even dredge up the tears to ask in nearly the same breath as she sent Percy off through the barrier with a faint pop, all the while glancing around to make sure no muggles were paying particularly close attention. Ginny made an effort to dry the worst of her eyes on her mother's sleeve. No use having blurry vision if it wasn't going to garner her the least bit of sympathy from her mother, and she'd prefer not to embarrass herself by crying needlessly, even if she was only doing so in front of a few muggles she'd never see again. Muggles, and that boy she'd seen before.

Ginny glanced over at the shadowy corner where she'd spotted the strange boy, ignoring Fred and George's antics with her mother. He was still standing there, his face a vision of disbelief as the twins disappeared in front of his eyes, as if he'd never seen a Transportation Barrier before. Unless he really hadn't. She knew from Percy's endless lecturing that there were all sorts of protective charms to stop Muggles noticing anything special about the barrier between Platforms Nine and Ten, and they even prevented Muggleborn wizards and witches from becoming this cognizant of the blatant magical activity in the middle of the bustling station, at least until they had it pointed out to them during their orientation day with the Head Boy and Girl, and she knew from Bill's grumbling about the six extra days they'd had to run on short notice just how much effort the Hogwarts staff were willing to go to in order to make sure everyone was able to attend. No, that boy didn't make any sense to her.

Ginny was left with little opportunity to ponder the strange boy before he rolled his trolley up to join them, his green eyes resting on her own for a moment. Face warming under his gaze, she stepped back to stand slightly behind her mother, suddenly hyperaware of the traitorous tears still clinging stubbornly to her lashes. When he looked away to talk to her mother, Ginny attempted to blink the water from her eyes as subtly as possible, but only succeeded in reddening them further, and she gave it up as a bad job. She retreated slightly further, still not entirely certain why she cared what this boy thought of her, though it didn't stop her from listening intently as her mother explained the Transportation Barrier, stifling a giggle at his politeness. He seemed so different from her brothers, and not just because of his lack of the Weasley-red hair and freckles common to almost everyone else she knew.

It was with a twinge of sadness that she watched the boy drag his trolley to face the barrier, and she turned away to hide the fresh tears she could feel beginning to stain her cheeks as he examined the wall. They'd only just met, but she still felt almost as if she'd known him for years, and now it was going to be a whole year before she had a chance to see him again and find out why exactly this boy seemed so familiar. She couldn't let that happen. Ginny turned, about to call out to the boy to stop for just a moment, but the cry caught in her throat as he stumbled almost as soon as set off, causing his snowy owl to hoot at him in what she imagined was a quite haughty tone for a bird. He looked at the owl for a moment, before turning his gaze on Ginny. She held it for a moment, staring back into his emerald eyes, but quickly remembered the tears still sticking to her face and dipped her head, hoping to hide the worst of it.

'Nice work, Weasley,' she thought to herself bitterly, 'You've made a right weepy sop of yourself, haven't you? Now he's going to walk through that barrier and never even look at you again, and you'll have no idea who he is or what's so special about him.'

Ginny let her shoulders slump in resignation, though she kept her ears focused, not willing to risk embarrassing herself further by looking up before the slight popping that accompanied the use of the barrier. In her concentration on the sound that never came, she completely missed the soft footsteps approaching her, and was consequently so surprised when a hand curled gently around her own that she didn't think to pull away from it, though she stiffened slightly at the unexpected contact, since neither her mother nor brothers would ever be quite so tender about grabbing her arm, except maybe Bill. It took Ginny a moment to realise that the hand lightly gripping her fingers belonged to the black-haired boy, and another moment to notice that he was speaking. To her.

Ginny felt her eyes slowly drifting upwards as he talked, and she noticed for the first time the state of his clothing. She knew her family had little money for new clothes, indeed her 'new' dresses and skirts were all in reality bought second-hand or transfigured and otherwise magically modified from her brothers' old clothes, but even her most patchwork hand-me-downs looked brand new compared to the tattered grey rags covering the boy. It was only when she heard him mention Hogwarts that Ginny realised she'd been too distracted by his strange looks and soft tone to actually pay attention to his words. She quickly looked away again, both to hide the blush creeping up her neck and to stop herself getting too distracted to hear his next words.

"I – I was wondering whether you'd mind if I were to write to you, G-Ginny."

She stared into the emerald-green orbs for a moment, searching for a hint of the twins' familiar mirth but finding only uncertain hope in his eyes. Her own brothers could barely find the time to send her even the smallest notes in their occasional letters home from Hogwarts, but this boy was going out of his way to offer, and Ginny thought he actually seemed serious. He really wanted to write to her.

He must have mistaken her stunned look for offense, as he quickly began a stuttering apology, though Ginny barely gave him a chance to speak before she pounced, wrapping her arms around him and thanking him with all the words she could find, and then again when it seemed that the vocabulary she had built up over ten years wasn't quite sufficient. By now, she'd completely given up on stopping her tears. It didn't seem as if the boy minded particularly, and her mother was probably used to it from her annual performances. She froze in the middle of her gratitude, remembering how her mother had reacted when she'd asked to see Luna. It certainly wouldn't help the situation that she was behaving so 'undignified and common', as Aunt Muriel would say.

Ginny tore herself away from the statuesque boy to turn to her mother with a whispered plea, her face falling at the tight purse of her lips. She could almost hear the admonishments coming now, "You'll only distract the poor boy when he's meant to be _studying, _Ginevra," or perhaps "No, Ginevra, you're far too young to be owling a _boy_." She had no idea why her mother was always so worried about her having any sort of contact with boys, it wasn't as if she didn't spend every summer living with six of them. She glared up at her mother, the effect lessened somewhat by her short stature and moistened eyes. At least, it would have been if her mother was actually looking at her. Instead, her gaze drifted up and down the boy, studying his messy hair and tattered clothes, before coming to rest on his eyes. Her expression softened and finally melted into a smile, barely leaving Ginny any chance to brace herself before being crushed in a Weasley hug.

She almost didn't mind as Ron hurried through the barrier, almost knocking an unfortunate pair of muggles to the ground as he passed. But then it was her new quill-pal's turn to go, and just as he began to move purposefully towards the brick wall, Ginny realised that in the excitement she'd never actually found out his name, and opened her mouth to ask him just as her mother apparently had the same idea. The tail end of his reply was lost as he stepped through the barrier, but the message was clear, even if it did take a few moments to properly sink in. Harry Potter was going to write to her.

Ginny's squeal of excitement was sufficiently loud to garner several dirty looks from passing muggles, as well as a hushed telling off from her mother.

"Be quiet, Ginny, or I'll leave you out here and you won't be able to watch the train leaving."

They were both well aware that the threat was an empty one, but Ginny still didn't want to risk her mother's ire, and the possibility that she might decide to forbid her writing to Harry after all. She didn't think that was particularly likely either, and she knew she'd find a way around whatever restrictions her parents tried if she had to, but it would be much easier if she didn't have to sneak around them.

"Sorry, mum. I'll be good." She bowed her head slightly, shoulders slumped. It wasn't exactly a natural response for her but it seemed to do the trick for the twins most of the time, and their transgressions tended to be significantly worse than a simple squeal in a station.

Satisfied with the response, Ginny's mum took her hand and, looking around to ensure none of the muggle attention lingered from her outburst, strode purposefully towards the wall. Ginny was about to clamp her eyes shut to minimise the disorientation, when it struck her that nobody had thought to warn Harry about the dizzying effects of the portal. Hopefully it wouldn't make him sick like Ron had been, the time he'd tried passing on to the platform with their eyes wide open. She hadn't been around to see it, but the Twins' annual Christmas recreation of the aftermath left little to the imagination. The sheer volume of fake vomit was probably a bit exaggerated, but given how far the youngest Weasley brother's blush spread, it didn't seem they were that far from the truth. She just hoped her forgetfulness hadn't consigned Harry to similar embarrassment. The floor in the entryway to Platform Nine and Three Quarters was as grimy as usual, but at least vomit-free, which she took to be something of a reassuring sign.

In any case, Ginny didn't have much opportunity to worry, as the train began to pull away with one last great puff of smoke just as she reached the platform's edge. Ignoring her mother's calls to "please be careful, Ginny", she ran alongside it, searching up and down the carriage windows in search of the shock of red hair that made her family so easy to find in a crowd. She'd known it was a lost cause from the start, of course. Percy would have gone straight to the prefects' compartment, and he wouldn't take the time to wave to her from a window like Bill had always done. The twins would likely be stalking the corridors in search of somebody to prank, and the youngest of her brothers probably hadn't even stowed his trunk yet.

Disregarding the futility of her actions, Ginny continued her search, eyes passing back and forth almost in time with the chacking of the train. Her disappointment at her brothers was so encompassing that she almost didn't notice the pair of emerald-green eyes watching her from a window. She waved up at her newfound friend, grinning in spite of her shortness of breath as he mirrored the action. The train accelerated until Ginny struggled to keep up with it, and she barely managed to slide to a halt before she fell off the platform, though she maintained her frantic waving as though her movement might slow the retreating carriage down slightly, so their goodbyes could last just a few moments longer.

All too soon, the train faded into the distance, leaving Ginny standing alone at the edge of the thinning crowd. She let her arm fall to her side, but stayed for what felt like hours, staring out at the point on the horizon where the tracks seemed to join as one as the platform quieted. Her mother's hand clasped around her wrist and they began the long trek home.

She just hoped Harry would remember her.


End file.
